How to Save a Life
by JPalmerGirl
Summary: Jimmy's lies are coming to a head and it only took a bruise to help them do so. Some secrets never stay buried when there is more to a twenty two year old man that meets the eye. Cancer patient!Jimmy, Sick!Jimmy, Younger!Jimmy.
1. Chapter 1

A bruise is what it took for somebody to notice Jimmy's secret. He was usually so careful, making sure to cover up the noticeable bruises with makeup and other cosmetic products. But he'd been so exhausted, he'd barely had an hour and a half of sleep so he'd been more concerned with picking out pants ad a shirt than covered the massive purple bruise spreading across the side of his face.

It was deep purple and spread across his cheek bone and across most of his nose, it was clearly swollen, even though he had tried to ice it. He was clumsy, that much was true, and he bruised easily even before his diagnosis. Now that he was pumped full of chemo drugs, he bruised even more so.

Acute Promyelocytic Leukemia.

He'd been diagnosed when he was eight and had been in and out of remission since then. He was dying, Jimmy knew it. That was why the director of NCIS helped him lie about his age so he could get the M.E assistant job with Dr. Mallard. Jimmy had wanted to experience life, he was a genius and had graduated from Harvard at 16 years old. But he'd never gotten to experience real life. So when the young Jimmy Palmer had come and pled his case, the director conceded and helped the boy.

Now at 17, Jimmy was in full blown Renal failure. He juggled chemo treatments, Hemodialysis appointments, and his job at NCIS along with feeling like utter hell most of the time. Yet nobody besides Vance, ever noticed something different about Jimmy Palmer. They didn't see the bags under his eyes, the way that his eyebrows didn't match the color of his hair (his wig was half a shade off), the way he always had to wear long sleeves to cover his PICC line (a tube in his arm).

If Jimmy Palmer was smiling, telling bad jokes and listening intently to Ducky's stories, then he was fine in their eyes. Jimmy Palmer was just the Autopsy Gremlin, he didn't have problems. He surely wasn't dying. But when Jimmy dragged himself into NCIS that morning, he honestly felt like it. He managed to grab a pair of gray sweatpants and a red sweatshirt that belonged to his older brother Clark, he had slipped on his wig and his glasses, even though his glasses rested painfully on the bruise that had blossomed on his face.

He knew that he had barely remembered to slip on his flip flops before having Clark drive him to NCIS. He was hoping that he could change into some scrubs in Autopsy. But instead he found himself walking though the bullpen, trying to remain unseen.

"Palmer? What the hell happened to you, Autopsy Gremlin?"

Jimmy winced at the unexpected yell from Tony, which sent McGee's and Ziva's eyes right at him. Both pairs of eyes widened in surprise and concern, but it was Gibbs' voice coming from behind him that made the young M.E assistant freeze.

"Palmer, you look dead on your feet. You alright?"

Gibbs barked and Jimmy spun around to look at the silver haired agent. He blinked owlishly at the older man, something that caused Gibbs to lean forwards and snap his fingers in front of Jimmy's eyes a few times. The young M.E jerked roughly backwards, only steadied by McGee's hand on his shoulder.

"Wahhhibah..."

Jimmy grunted incoherently, as he blinked at Gibbs in shock. The older man's brow furrowed and he leaned forwards, extending a hand towards Palmer's forehead.

"Are you okay, Palmer?"

Gibbs asked and Jimmy's eyes focused on him blearily. Gibbs' eyes widened as the young man looked at him, for a moment the young man didn't look like a young man, he looked like Kelly did when she was sick and accidentally puked on his shoes. Then just as he was about to check the young M.E assistant's forehead, Vance's voice echoed from upstairs.

"Palmer, my office, now. Gibbs, bring him."

Vance yelled, Gibbs nodded before gently taking Jimmy by the shoulder and leading the half comatose boy up to Vance's office. Gibbs made sure to always keep a hand on the boy after he almost tripped and fell down the stairs several times. Whenever they reached the door, Vance nodded at Gibbs to leave and he did so...but not without a concerned look sent towards the young M.E assistant. Once Gibbs finally left, Vance looked at the young man in pure concern, bending forwards to rest a hand on his knee.

"Jimmy, you alright?"

The young medical assistant looked at Vance with blank eyes. Before sighing softly and letting his shoulders slump forwards in exhaustion. The bags under his eyes had bags of their own and he looked as if he were about to pass out.

"Chemo's not working, Vance."

Jimmy whispered softly, his voice sounding utterly hollow and broken as he did so. Vance's eyes clouded and he sighed audibly as he walked out from behind his desk and knelt in front of the upset teen.

"How long do we have Jimmy? What's our game plan."

"Hope for a transplant. If I'm not in remission at the end of this chemo then they're putting me on hospice till I croak. Don't worry...I'll resign before then."

Jimmy whispered with his hollow and broken-sounding voice. A voice that was so different from his usual peppy tones. But Vance had seen the boy at his lowest, when Jimmy couldn't breathe without the tube in his mouth. Vance just stood and set his hand on the boy's shoulder.

"We'll find you a kidney, Jimmy."

And those words broke the dam and left Vance with a sobbing seventeen year old in his arms. He could feel the boy's arm tube pressing into his side. As he choked and sobbed roughly. Vance just let the boy cry his heart out. Making sure to remind the boy that he would be sleeping in the couch in his office until he was feeling better, which brought on a whole new slew of tears.


	2. Chapter 2

Ch2

Jimmy Palmer woke up to the distinct feeling of a cool hand on his forehead. The young man groaned and couldn't help but lean into the soft yet calloused hand, before he realized just what he was doing and his eyes snapped open and stretched wide. Vance was hovering over him, a concerned frown hardening his mouth and his brow furrowed in anger and quite a bit of worry. Just as Jimmy was about to open his mouth to say something, he was instantly silenced by a pointed look from the director and snapped it shut with a clap. He allowed Vance to finish with his ministrations before the older man stood back up from where he had kneeled slightly.

"Well, you don't seem to have a fever. But do you want me to call your brother just in case?"

Vance whispered, holding up his phone unconsciously as he asked. But Jimmy shook his head forcefully, his loosened wig shuffling awkwardly on his head as he did so. Jimmy really didn't want to bother Clark, not while he was at work. He worked in the construction business and it wasn't that Jimmy thought he wouldn't come.

He knew that Clark would drop everything and be there to get him in three seconds flat. It's just that with all the hospital stays, expensive medicines, dialysis and the like...Clark and Jimmy both had to work to stay afloat. Clark would even try to push extreme hours at the yard, which only resulted in an exhausted and rundown Clark.

"No, it's fine. I'll just go down to Autopsy and change before getting to work."

Jimmy hurriedly said, pushing himself off the couch and to his still shaky legs. But when he saw the scathing look on Vance's face, he quickly tried to reassure the older man of his capability.

"I'm fine, Vance. I'm well aware of my limits."

Jimmy visibly flinched at the next look that the director sent his way. It clearly said, if-you-knew-your-limits-you-wouldn't-be-at-work, that along with the crossed arms and frown finished the picture of a disappointed Vance, quite nicely. It's not that Jimmy blamed him however, he knew that Vance had children of his own and that he considered Jimmy to be part of that equation.

He wasn't sure how it had happened, probably the day that Vance held his skinny and shaking body above a toilet as he vomited up bile and the remnants of chemo drugs. Vance had been there through most of the hard times.

"Look, I'll be fine okay?"

Jimmy whispered, letting his mask slip for a moment. Just as Vance tried feebly to compose his. Why did the kid always do this to him? Make the once impenetrable mask of indifference on his face shatter into a million fragments. It wasn't right what the kid did to him.

"Fine. Get your ass down to Autopsy, Palmer and change out of those grungy clothes."

Vance barked, roughly and he could see the subtlest hints of a smile on the corners of Jimmy's mouth. Just as the young Medical Examiner's Assistant, nodded and left the room. Smile fragments still in the same place.

-TimeSkip-

By the time a refreshed Jimmy walked into Autopsy, he'd replaced his wig, changed into scrubs, washed his face and hands before hurrying into the wing. What he wasn't expecting was the way that Dr. Mallard looked at him in surprise, before his eyes crinkled as he took in the bruise marring Jimmy's face.

"Mr. Palmer, why are you still here? You should be at home, according to what Jethro and Tony told me."

Dr. Mallard hurried over to rest a hand on the young man's arm. Who soon flinched away from the gentle hand. It wasn't that he didn't appreciate Dr. Mallard's concern, but his arms were off limits nowadays. They were bumpy and raised from needle abrasions and the like, he realized that they must've looked like the marks of drug users, of addicts and he really didn't want to worry the kind doctor. Jimmy forced a smile onto his face before reassuring Dr. Mallard, kindly.

"Oh I'm fine, Dr. Mallard. Don't worry."

Jimmy grinned reassuringly, gently tugging his arm away from the clutches of the Scottish doctor. The older man seemed unconvinced but he just shrugged and hurried back over to the Autopsy table, where the body of a young man was laying. The young man had cornrow blond hair and freckled skin, and if Jimmy pried open his eyes, he would bet that they would be as blue-green as the ocean at high tide.

He knew this young man with the scarred lumps on his arms like those that Jimmy sported. He was on dialysis just like Jimmy.

"Danny McArthur?"

Jimmy whispered under his breath, eyes stretched wide.


	3. Chapter 3

Danny McArthur was in kidney cancer remission, that was how Jimmy had met him and that was how he was when he died. He hadn't spoken to the young man despite to say 'hello' when he came into the dialysis center, but his older brother had been a different story. Erik 'Sunshine' McArthur was Danny's older brother by almost a year and he was the first person whom Jimmy had ever made love too.

No, he didn't call it sex or fucking. Not like other males his age liked to call the girls that they hooked up with. No, for Jimmy and Erik it had been making love. Erik had been a Stage 4S Neuroblastoma, he'd first been diagnosed as a sixteen year old, at Stage 4.

_A fifteen year old Jimmy had been at the hospital for a routine chemo appointment when a sixteen year old teenage boy had almost tackled his IV pole. The boy had been a new cancer patient, Jimmy hadn't seen him there before. He would've recognized the sandy colored hair and the golden tanned skin that radiated health. Something that was seldom there on the chemo ward. _

_Jimmy had resolved not to bother getting to know the boy, he hated to watch the transformation from healthy normal person to pain-stoned cancer patient. But the boy had wheedled his way into Jimmy's heart without his consent. But Erik was far from perfect...and that was why Jimmy fell and fell hard. _

_"Just sit tight, Sunshine o' mine. It'll pass."_

_Jimmy whispered gently as he hugged his larger boyfriend to his chest. His face was pressed against Erik's balding, limp and sheen-less locks as the exhausted boy's face tinted green and tried to hold down his vomit. Even though he was clearly nauseated. Jimmy ran tentative fingers through the balding hair on his own head, the light bristly hair that he had managed to grow back in his last remission. _

_"Jimmy...l..."_

_Whatever Erik had been planning to say was cut off as he was throw forwards and projectile vomited into the wastebasket that Jimmy had hurried grabbed. Erik seemed to puke forever, the acid spewing from his mouth and dribbling from his nose. Jimmy knew first hand how much that burned. The younger teen gently rubbed his hand down the shaking older boy's back as he vomited painfully. Retching in a way that couldn't be comfortable. _

_-TheLastMonths-_

_Jimmy had been there as Erik's healthy sheen had faded to a sickly pale, as the lean muscle that had littered his body was gone, replaced by ribs that jutted out of his body like knives. Jimmy wanted to cry as he looked into the jaundiced eyes of the boy he loved. His liver was failing him. Jimmy's hair was gone as well and he had started a new chemo round as Erik's tumor grew even larger. It was one of those last nights that Jimmy spent sitting beside Erik's hospital bed, that Erik said it._

_"I'm really gonna die, aren't I Jimmy?"_

_Erik whispered, his voice hoarse and sick-sounding. It made Jimmy's heart clench painfully as he looked at the eighteen year old young man he loved. He couldn't bring himself to lie to the dying boy so he merely nodded, bending over to bury his face in the starchy, white hospital pillow beneath Erik's skull. So the older boy couldn't see the tears that coursed unheeded down his cheeks. But Erik seemed to know what he was doing because his next words brought on more tears._

_"If it's possible to send a message from heaven, I'll get one to you."_

_Jimmy sobbed loudly as Erik gently moved his face from the pillow, Jimmy knew that his face was smeared with hot tears and that he was clearly exhausted but Erik gently used his forefinger and thumb to wipe away the glassy tears before pressing Jimmy's mouth to his own. Their first kiss was hot and fiery fueled with the passion of dying and the fact that it would probably be the only time they ever did this. They made love that night, it was both their first times...their only times. _

_Erik died three days later. _

_In life people always have some measure of control whether it be over their emotions or choices, but when it comes to cancer? If it wants to kill you. You die. There's no miracle like in the movies, no perfect cure or savior for the brave cancer patient. You just die. It not ceremonious and epic, you just stop breathing...it's just a ceasing of bodily functions. Nothing spectacular...nothing amazing. Just absolutely devastating, because the person you knew is just gone. Like they were there one moment...but then that moment ended and they were gone. Like the blink of an eye. _

_They cremated him and spread his ashes under a tree in a graveyard, nothing but a small plague beneath it to symbolize how a short and stunning life had ended. It's funny really, when you die, it's not as dramatic as you would think...nobody really notices when someone is really gone. At best you may hear a whisper, a soft hot breath near your ear, maybe a gust of wind whipping through your hair. That's it. That all. _

-PresentDay-

"Mr. Palmer?"

At the sound of Dr. Mallard's concerned and accented voice, Jimmy shook his head and brushed his thoughts away from the forefront of his mind. Instead he looked at the body of the boy that was so much like his Erik. His relation to Erik was clear in the face, the sculpted point of his narrow chin, the shape of his eyes and the fair, cornrow blond locks that Jimmy would bet would fall over his eyes when he was thinking. Just like Erik's had done. Jimmy felt a familiar twinge of pain in his chest as memories of long days spent with Erik assaulted his mind.

"Do you know this boy, Mr. Palmer?"

Dr. Mallard tried again and Jimmy nodded softly, pain laced eyes darting over to look at the scottish M.E who was gazing at him in eyes creased with worry and concern.

"Yes, his name is Daniel McArthur. I knew his brother."

Jimmy whispered, still unable to tear his eyes away from the face that could've been Erik's. Jimmy forced himself to see the birth mark under Danny's left eye, to see the was the nose was slightly too small, the way the smile was crooked..things that were only Danny's, not his older brother's. He had spent a long time grieving for Erik, he was gone and Jimmy had to deal. He just hated the fact that the pain could come back so quickly, fit right into the hole it had left behind. As if to say, 'I'm back...I know you recognize me."


End file.
